Indirectly Yes
by L. E. Mentol
Summary: "You said you wanted to tell me something." "No, I said I wanted to talk to you about something."
_**Edit: Just fixed a few things nothing big just some missing words and grammar errors... hopefully I got the most distracting ones at least.**_

* * *

There was a good reason as to why Sasuke was sitting out here, in his car, parked right outside Sakura's apartment building… well it wasn't necessarily a "good" reason per say… to him at least.

He sighed for probably the fifth time since he sat out there. Constantly going over in his head, how exactly he was supposed to… apologize to his friend for his rudeness, insensitivity, and, as Naruto had so kindly put it, for him having the "largest possible pole up his ass". From what Naruto had told him, those were Sakura's exact words… aside from the last one… he hoped.

He came here, ready to apologize, then ready to defend himself on why he wasn't at fault, but upon reassessing the cause of conflict he guessed she had every right to be mad at him… but for _three_ _months_?

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He'd started working as a mechanic at a well known dealership for two years now, a guaranteed job after he got his degree. And today wasn't his best day. Aside from small annoyances here and there, co workers being uncooperative, the sudden news that because of a customer's complaint his job may be at risk again, it was just a busier day than most, not even his lunch break was enough to calm him down.

It was a little after four thirty into the evening, that he felt his phone, tucked deep in his pocket, begin to vibrate. With his hands as dirty as they were, not to mention he was currently with his coworkers, being the youngest one in the shop only meant that his seniors can only make things more difficult for him. So he let the phone ring, assuming it was his mom or probably his brother that had forgotten he worked today, he told himself he'd check on his next break.

As he continued with the repairs his mind and thoughts plagued him. If it wasn't anything big they would've just texted him. Calling him meant it had to be something important, what if Itachi was broken down somewhere? What if his _mom_ was broken down somewhere? What if someone _died_?

Quickly wiping the grease off his hands, he quickly made his way to the deserted break room, his phone at hand. As soon as his phone was unlocked, he swiped down and was a bit confused.

 _1 missed call_

 _Sakura_

Now he and Sakura had been friends for years, seven years to be exact. They had remained in _inconsistent_ contact with each other for the longest time. Now being as inconsistent as it was she would usually text him random things going on, even mentioning how she was freaking out about how it had now been a month and a half since her last period. But it was always that; texts and not that frequent either. Except whenever he'd rarely call her, or he'd text her if she was willing to take in some stray he had found.

Even when, on an even rarer occasion, she called him she would text him first, making sure he wasn't busy like when she… yeah.

So the fact that there was only a call and no message to go along with it had him worried. Why wasn't she calling him again? Was she in trouble? Did some gangsters target her and now she was unable to reach her phone?

In an almost panic he quickly hit the call back button, growing more and more anxious as each ring went by. Until, finally, at the fifth ring she picked up, "Hi, guy." She greeted him in an almost tired voice.

He held back a relieved exhale, "Hey," he greeted back, "What happened?" She was safe. She probably came back from work that would explain her tired sounding voice. So what could be wron-

He heard her take a deep breath, "I'm sad," and she sounded it. But that fact was far from Sasuke's head.

 _She's... sad… She's sad… she's…_ _ **sad?!**_

"Well what do you want me to do about that Sakura?!" he almost yelled to the phone.

There was a millisecond pause on the other line before, "Well I was _hoping_ you'd make me feel better about it!" she yelled back.

"I'm at work! I don't have time to –"

"Then why the hell did you call me back when you were still busy?!"

"I _thought_ something _happened_!"

He heard her scoff on the other side, "Well nothing happened, Sasuke, so go back to work, I'll call you later," she grumbled the last part.

"Fine bye," he said just as he heard her hang up.

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She never called him back that night, nor did she the next day.

After a few weeks passed, he had almost forgotten about their little exchange, he never even counted it as a fight. He reflected on it often, wondering if he was being too rude, possibly taking out his frustrations of the day on her, but what can he do now? What was done was done. So he went on with his life.

It wasn't until a week ago when Naruto was home on his break that he was made aware that Sakura was indeed mad at him.

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.

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"Why?"

"Are you serious?" he gave him a bored expression.

"Yes, why is she mad at me?" Sasuke asked taking a bit from his sandwich.

"In her exact words, "he's a rude, heartless, insensitive jerk, with possibly the largest pole stuck up his ass."" The smirk on Naruto's face wasn't helping Sasuke believe those were Sakura's exact words.

"She didn't say that."

"Believe what you want," Naruto folded his arms, "Just saying you might wanna fix this, I mean, it's been three months hasn't it?"

 _Three months…_ That's the longest… that's the longest that Sakura hadn't talked to him… or well texted him aside from wishing him a happy birthday, and even that was short and curt.

He felt his eyes widen as he looked back up to his blond friend, "She's actually mad at me?"

"Yes! That's what I've been telling you!"

"What did I do though?!"

"She said she called you the day she quit her job and you were just all over the place with assholery."

"She quit her…" The almost forgotten voice of Sakura saying, " _I'm sad_ ," slowly resurfaced in his mind. It had been her first job, and she had mentioned that she would be leaving it soon to fully dedicate herself to school a few weeks before that phone call, that she had made good friends there... "Why did she call me? What about Ino?"

"She said she texted Ino and called you."

"But –"

"And! That you keep giving her mixed signals," he pointed an accusatory finger in his friend's direction.

"Mixed signals?"

"She thought she could come to you for these kinds of things."

"Why?!"

"I need a hug," Naruto pitched his voice, "Well what time are you usually home?" his voice deepening significantly.

Sasuke nearly smacked himself with embarrassment, "She told you about that?"

"Yup, and how you actually went over and hung out with her after work, just to give her that much needed hug."

Sasuke groaned.

"So yeah, our little Saku-cakes would probably expect you to comfort her after that, but no," he stretched the two letter word out, "You just went and did a full 180 with that "the hell you want me to do about it?""

He pressed his face down onto his folded arms, "I'm such… an _asshole_ ," he groaned out.

"And he admits it!"

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.

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And so, there he is. Still wondering how Sakura would react to him showing up unexpectedly at her doorstep.

He knew he should've been more understanding towards her. She had been a bit depressed for a while, too. Ugh, he was such an idiot.

Three months it took him to realize, and not even on his own for Christ's sake, that his closest friend was mad at him.

What made it even worse was that she had been trying so hard to keep their friendship strong. They were hardly ever able to see each other, texting and phone calls and just this feeling that the other was okay was the only thing that connected them. Especially after she… admitted to liking him, back in high school.

Well not exactly. The only way he could describe their conversation that day, was that she had found a loophole in the dreaded art of confessing.

 _Are you busy?_

 _Not really why?_

 _I'm going to call you in like 5 minutes. I want to talk to you about something._

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" _You remember how there were some rumors going about in school?_ "

"Rumors about what?" Sasuke asked as he took a bite of his pizza, his brother, Itachi, to his right ate in silence carefully watching his brother.

" _It was usually among our friends._ "

"Um," he thought, placing his pizza down, "about who?"

" _About me… and about you._ "

"About me and you?" he felt his brother's undivided attention on him now. _About me and Sakura… oh no._

" _We got teased a lot or well I did…_ " she continued.

"Hold on, I think I know what you're talking about," _The rumors that Sakura and he were dating._ They were just rumors though, they were just close friends.

" _So you remember?_ "

He was starting to think that his brother was able to hear everything Sakura was saying by the smile he was giving him, "Yeah, I think… so what about it?" he asked cautiously.

" _Did you know?_ "

"Did I know?"

" _Just tell me if you knew._ "

"Knew what?" his brother was rolling his eyes at that point.

" _Dude, everyone knew or at least guessed, just tell me if you knew or not._ "

"Everyone knew?"

" _Even some teachers knew!_ "

"The teachers?!"

"The teachers?" Itachi exclaimed.

" _Are you on speaker? Is Itachi listening?!_ _I bet he even knew!_ "

Sasuke turned towards his brother, who mouthed, "I did."

"What did he know?"

" _I-swear-to, I'm not saying it! You know what I'm talking about!_ "

"I seriously don't know!" He thought it over quickly, until finally it clicked… _I had suspicions but…_ that's all it was it had always been suspicions but he pushed it all to the side, "Oh," he ignored his brother's praises to the skies.

" _Yeah, oh,"_ she simply said on the other line, " _So you did know…_ "

"Ah," his hand rubbed at his neck, "I mean, I guess I thought that maybe you did but nothing was ever… confirmed."

He heard her giving a breathy laugh, " _So it wasn't because I was being obvious?_ "

"I didn't even think you were being obvious," he heard his brother whisper a, "How dense can you be?"

" _Well, that's good I guess, I was just… thinking back that maybe you knew like everyone else._ "

"She told everyone?" Itachi asked next to him.

" _No,_ " she exclaimed, obviously hearing his brother, " _They just kinda figured it out, ignoring my constant rejection of the matter._ "

"Oh okay, so you, little brother, were just that slow," Itachi said taking another bite of his pizza, earning a light punch to the arm by his little brother.

Sasuke heard Sakura's light giggles on the other line.

"So you're going to tell me properly now?"

" _Tell you?_ "

"You wanted to tell me something."

" _No, I said I wanted to talk to you about something._ "

"Yeah, so?"

" _I already did._ "

"So assuming, that I am talking about what you're talking about we already talked about whatever it is you wanted to talk about?" he ignored his brother's muttered, "wow" next to him.

" _Yes._ "

Sasuke stayed silent for a while pondering, it had been six years since those rumors died out in high school, why was she…

"Do you," he hesitated, she had made such an effort in not forwardly saying that she liked him he wasn't about to ruin it, "Do you still…" he paused.

" _Ah… no, no… Well I hope not._ " She said quietly, ending that topic of their next three hour conversation for the evening.

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" _What a round-about way of confessing, wouldn't you say?_ " as his brother nicely put it.

After reflecting on the matter, he managed to get out of the car and slowly made himself walk to her building and ascend the stairs. She tried so hard not to let that conversation affect their friendship… and it hadn't, technically the conversation was never brought up again.

She had, in a way, confessed to him about the crush she may or may not still have on him from seven years ago. And never once, did she ask if he had liked her back.

His eyes remained trained ahead as he made his way to her apartment door, but his mind wandered. Did she want to spare her own feeling with the possible answer? Did she not expect him to return her feelings? From back then… even now? She probably never considered asking. She didn't see her worth.

 _You don't see a lot of things._

He had told her once, and he meant it. She didn't see how important she was to him. How glad her inconsistent communication with him made him. He didn't notice her lack of communication because he was patiently waiting for her, not because he didn't notice. She was the constant inconsistency in his life she had to realize it. She was… his best friend.

 _No,_ he stopped in front of her door. He hated that. He would hold back his frown whenever she said it. " _You're my best guy friend, Sasuke._ " She said it so often to him, to remind him, possibly to convince herself. Being her friend… that's all he had ever been, that's all she'd allow herself to see him as.

It's been seven years… it took her six to finally say something in respect to her feelings as indirect as it may have been.

He let his hand knock on her door twice, and waited patiently.

It might have taken him seven and a bit of reflecting…

He heard her footsteps approaching the door.

But he wasn't going to be as _indirect_ as she had been.

She opened the door. Her eyes widen at the sight of him, before she crossed her arms.

"What brings you here?"

They may have been in a "fight" for three months but they hadn't seen each other in person for seven. He took a good look at her, as much as her body language told him that she was furious, her bright, gleaming eyes told him that she was happy to see him.

And that only further strengthened his decision.

"… _I need to talk to you about something._ "

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 **And there it is. YES I KNOW I SHOULD BE WORKING ON COVER GIRL. But I had to get this out of my head first. Just a simple one-shot, I think my first post of the year? Well yeah. Don't worry I'll work on CG in a bit, sigh so distracted. Any way, here you go? What do you think? Huh, huh, huh?!~ Ahem.**

 **Anyway, thanks for reading!**

 **Ja ne!**

 **-Ira**


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